Coexistence
by tetsuia
Summary: Ringed eyes brought the shinobi world into genocide, stripping free will and intelligence from those unlucky enough to meet their interest. To avert a dark future, one man sacrifices the present to go back to the past.
1. Prologue: Causality Altered

A/N: This is the revised prologue of Coexistence. I hope you will read and review. Please enjoy the revised chapter.

A/N: Revisions based on clarity. I haven't abandoned this fic. It's on the backburner in favor of my Persona 3 Hospital one. .

Prologue: Causality Altered

The stench of blood was everywhere, saturating the air of the pitch-black room.

_Step one...rotation._

Wisps of a dull purple slowly started to collect in the center of the room. As the violet aura became larger, it started rotating in a spiral and continued to rotate faster and faster. The light of the collected energy was enough to illuminate what was beneath the the eye of the growing maelstrom; an unmarred right hand stood still under the growing bundle of energy.

After several minutes, the room itself erupted into a flare of red light, temporarily illuminating a man sitting down in a meditative position. Just as fast as the flare had come, it vanished leaving behind glowing red lines which covered the floor, the walls, and the ceiling. All of these lines contained the scent of blood.

_Step two...power._

The rough shape of a ball began to take form in the center of the purple maelstrom. As the purple mass grew in size, it turned from a thin spinning spiral into a vibrating bright purple sphere with tendrils whipping about. Several of the tendrils whipped across the man's face and arms, leaving deep cuts with the blood leaking onto his pale blue clothes.

Illuminated by the sphere's incandescense, the man's shoulder-length hair could be seen with its shades of brown and blonde. His short-sleeved blue gi had large clean cuts with blood splatters all over. The man's eyes were closed and the expression of his face was neutral as it was cut up by the sharp violet blades he was feeding.

However, as soon as a cut had appeared, the man's skin appeared to hiss and bubble over the wound until there was no sign an injury had ever existed.

_Step three... control._

The tendrils stopped lashing out, brought to bind with the new mass of purple energy. The ball started to vibrate in place with the sound of a soft breeze being replaced by a horrific high-pitched shriek. The sound of nails upon chalkboard would have been harminous and calming in the midst of this sound...

Drip.

Drip.

A dark crimson liquid fell onto the floor and onto the shoulders of the dirty-blonde man. The origins of the liquid became clear as the man's ears oozed out dark red, the crimson dripping out at steady intervals. The man did not wince or even twitch as he continued to hold his right hand out with the hellishly bright ball. The intensity of sound and light increased with the size of the purple sphere.

The bright light of the sphere completely illuminated the entire room, revealing the finer features of the man: the thin scar that vertically bisected his left eye, the rows of black seal markings that ran across his right arm and part of his exposed chest, and his heavily scarred left arm which became more grizzly as one trailed their gaze down.

The small room he was in shook for a moment before it was still once more. As soon as the room stopped shaking, his heavily scarred left hand started to go into motion. It picked up speed as it started moving through more and more hand seals.

The pale red markings of the room suddenly glowed into a brilliant sanquine red, though the intensity of the red glow paled in comparison to that of the purple orb. The lines of red markings continued to glow in increasing intensity as the man continued to move through his array of half-seals.

_Was this truly the only way?_

His left hand slowed...paused...and then started again. Before long, his left hand moved just as fast as before...and then even faster. His left hand then transformed into a blur of motion. Meanwhile, the purple ball of light had a diameter the length of his chest. It burned brighter than the mid-day sun, its incandescense infathomable to human eyes.

The lids of his left eye fluttered several times, barely opening and closing. A look of concentration appeared on the man's previously stoic face. As he breathed in, the lids of his eye opened a tiny sliver before closing again upon his exhale. Several minutes later, as the man repeated this motion on top of moving his left hand and focusing on the ball on his right, the lids of his eye opened. For a moment, his left eye could be seen, strange circles of gold radiating from a black pupil like ripples within a lake. Then, red lines haphazardly crossed the golden lines as his eye was forced to look at the violet sphere. The pupil of his eye constricted until it was no longer visible. The golden lines turned into lines of darkest black before disappearing entirely. All that was left was a completely white eyeball with blood pooling out of his eyelids.

_Never had been able to use that eye since it happened anyways._

His left hand finally stopped at the sign of the rooster with the red markings pulsating at fast intervals. His right hand blistered from the heat of the bright violet ball, blistering and then healing over again...and again...and again. The man continued to sit stoically despite the pain, simply waiting for something to happen.

He inhaled. He exhaled and brought his left hand under his right hand, under the orb of violet energy he had created.

He closed his eyes for one moment as his nightmares were brought back up to his conscious mind.

--

_A scarred hand impaling the forehead of a pale-eyed woman, pink matter dripping out of the wound.._

--

_The blood-filled lips of a man upturned to a calm smile. Red eyes with peculiar black markings stared from behind long black hair._

--

_A smile from a white-haired old man before turning into the dust._

--

_The withered arm of an elderly blonde woman as she said her goodbyes. A beating heart and a line of intestines lied on the floor._

--

Eyes opened up again with a determined expression.

His hands moved into his stomach, the ball melted the skin and part of his abdomen as it entered. Tendrils of skin could be visibly seen trying to reattach itself around with minor success. And then the ball exploded.

As intestines and blood whip across the room from the maelstrom he's unleashed, his last thought before it turned his brain to flying ash and erased several miles of land from existence was...

_Home._


	2. Demon and Child

A/N:

tabemono604: Thank you for your review. . This chapter is actually the joining-together for two chapters, so enjoy.

NyNyFiction: Thanks for reviewing. When you think hard about the description of the move in the prologue, the man becomes easy to identify. Well, that's assuming you've read that far into the manga (or watched the anime (brrr…)) I find it hard to write something for a prolonged period of time…

Ming Yun is looking for a beta-reader by the way. He's also not too sure on how to look at the pms he's received either. . Thank you and enjoy the next chapter.

Chapter 1: Child and Demon

The mid-day summer sun rose above on Konohagakure no Sato, the Village Hidden in the Leaves, delivering its wrath of sweltering heat to the village. Most of the villagers, ninja and civilian alike, plodded through the market square slowly to avoid ruining their social image by sweating like a hog. Those that did not walk sat or lied in the shadow of trees and buildings, allaying the sun's wrath by avoiding its gaze. Those that did not fall into those two categories were the sensible ones staying indoors and utilizing electric or man-powered fans to beat the heat. There was also a final category which few people took in this muggy weather.

On this day, exactly two people could be seen running throughout town. One was clearly not sane as the man sported a horrible green leotard with long orange socks, screaming something about the power of youth as he ran the perimeter of Konoha's city walls. The other, in fashion sense, was not much better as he wore an orange jumpsuit and pants, but the blonde-haired blue-eyed child with whisker markings on the sides of his face could play off his running in the hot humid weather as childish exuberance or "The Power of Youth" in the words of the crazy running green-claded man.

Bolting through the now-glaring passerbys, the blond youngster ran as if a lion, a twenty-foot terror native to Konoha, was after him. Though, in this case, it wasn't a lion, but something potentially more threatening. The source of the threat appeared moments later in the form of two male teenagers, appearing from wisps of smoke onto the rooftops, looking for the child. Both sported a headband with the symbol of the village, a spiral slightly extrapolated with a tip drawn on the other side...the rough shape of a leaf.

But that was not the glaringly obvious trait between them.

Both of them had orange hair and skin obviously from paint. From the disgruntled looks that peered out from their orange visage, they did not place the paint on themselves. The object of their ire was noted when one pointed and motioned at the kid down on the street while the other gave a scowl and took out a kunai.

They needed no skills at tracking to determine where the kid was. After all, the kid ran around in an orange jumpsuit in an area of lethargic slow-moving people. He might as well have been an elephant among a field of wheat. When the kid turned out of their line of sight, the two teenagers gave chase, only to be baffled when the kid seemingly vanished.

The pair walked towards the block to where the child disappeared to. The kid was likely still somewhere in the village market after all. The block had a couple of merchants peddling their wares. Baskets, tapestries, and clothes of all kinds could be found in the stalls, some plain as the dust on the ground to some extragavant with their gold and silver threads.

Their search proving fruitless, the two angry men cursed their inability to find the youngster, knowing that the kid probably ran away by now. To alleviate their anger and their now-growing appetites from chasing the kid around, they walked to the only food stall on the block, a ramen stand with the banner "Ichiraku Ramen" on it.

One of them called out to an old man with grey hair lazily flapping a fan in front of his face, sitting on the stools in front of a wooden counter.

"Old man! Get us something to eat!"

"It's Ichiraku-san to you and we're closed! Too hot to be cooking today! You two whippersnappers get out!" the old man yelled back, standing up and over the two teenagers. His fan laid forgotten as he slowly closed the distance between them, his height towering over the two.

The teenagers gave a final glare at the old man before walking out of the stand, toppling a chair over from their exit. The man muttered something nasty as he walked slowly towards the chain and placed it in its proper spot. A squeak from behind the counter caused him to slowly turn around and smile.

"Is it safe to come out yet?" Blonde hair and blue eyes peeked over the wooden counter, nervously scanning the streets and the passerbys who walked around.

"Yes Naruto-kun. I still don't get why you decided, of all days, to pick a fight with a pair of shinobi. Chunnin, no less." The old man sighed, watching Naruto guffaw heartedly before the small child adopted a more serious tone.

"They laughed when I said I was going to be Hokage so I pranked them." Naruto said with the innocence of a child. Ichiraku grinned, but internally sighed. Hokage, the leader of this ninja village, was a title held by the greatest of all shinobi. Though it was an admirable goal, Naruto had no chance of achieving it because of the demon sealed inside him.

Kyuubi.

_---_

_The crimson sky. The quaking earth. A crushing aura. Eight years ago._

_Herded along with the rest of the village to the Hokage Monument, a mountain with the faces of the four Hokages in Konoha history, a man with brown hair peppered with gray purposefully moved against the flow of the crowd._

_"Where's Ayame-chan?" yelled the man, his arms pushing people aside as he moved against the flow of the panicked people who were too distracted to listen or had only feared for their own family's lives. He continued to roughly push people out of the way, uncaring about the others and only about the safety of his own daughter. Despite…_

_The omnipotent aura out in the distance. The burning radiance over the horizon. The unnatural heat all around._

_"Ichiraku-san. Please come with the villagers. If she's in there, there's nothing you can do for her now," said a shinobi wearing a green flak vest and a headband. He grabbed Ichiraku's shoulder, trying to keep him in place. The shinobi was shaking in fear, not of the man he was grabbing, but the powerful force out in the distance which threatened to engulf all._

_However, it was the wrong thing to say to Ichiraku at the time because moments later he unexpectedly (or expectedly) shoulder-rammed the distracted ninja, knocking him into the crowd and forcing him to release his grip. By the time the shinobi collected his bearings, Ichiraku was gone, shrouded by the wave of panicking men, women, and children._

_As Ichiraku started to reach to the end of the crowd, the people became more and more agitated, all desiring to get out of the path of the predator behind them. Ichiraku himself, if he was not driven by his mission to find his only daughter, would have ran in the other direction, an unnatural fear driven into his heart. He ran further and further down the city, approaching the source of Konoha's distress._

_The buildings and structures were intact in this part of the city since the horror of this day hadn't reach them yet, but the unusual smell of urine and feces permeated the air. On the ground were the bodies of villagers and ninja lying on the floor, unmarked but clearly dead, with a look of fright and horror etched permanently on their pale faces. Those still living were breathing erratically, but the color on their faces were returning from a pale ghostly white to a normal flesh-colored tone. Ichiraku closed his eyes as he ran past both the corpses and those recovering, putting his hands together and muttering a silent prayer...for those that died, for those that lived, and for Ayame to be all right._

_As he approached his place of business, his ramen stand, the corpses surrounding him increased as well as the amount of dead animals in the area. Birds, dogs, rats, and all other animals succumbed to the same fear that the corpses lying on the ground had experienced. He started to become afraid, fearing that whatever evil that had killed everyone and everything from, what it appears to be, simple fear might have killed Ayame too._

_"Ayame-chan! Where are you!?" Ichiraku approached the dingy ramen shop, the outside partially crushed by a large fragment of building. He clawed at the pieces of rocks he was able to move, creating a hole large enough for him to pass through. He ran through the upturned chairs and tables, though the counter was miraculously intact, and made a beeline to the trapdoor he invested on such an occasion._

_This was a shinobi village after all, and it was only a matter of time before they entered into another Great Shinobi War with the other villages. The only reason why he hadn't moved to somewhere safer as a civilian was the business and the fact that Konoha was relatively safe from strife because, to him, it was the strongest of all the shinobi villages with a kind and benevolent ruler who prefers peace to war._

_A nervous voice came out when Ichiraku opened the trapdoor, asking, "Ojii-san...is that you? I'm scared." A girl with short brown hair, no older than five, peeked out the trapdoor and then lifted up by the man. Both hugged each other with Ichiraku thanking whatever deities had helped save her today. However, their meeting was short-lived as the entirety of the building started to shake again, the ceiling turning to chunks on the floor. Picking up the girl and keeping her close to his chest, Ichiraku said, "We're going now! Don't be scared. We'll be fine."_

_Rushing for the hole he had made, he heard a large rumbling and a growl which was followed by the voice of a woman, "We have to hold off the Kyuubi before Yondaime-sama gets here! Don't let it near the Monument!"_

_The collective cheer resonated in the air before the sounds of battle arose again. Ichiraku heard explosions, quakes, and the hisses of a katon jutsus flying about as he left his now destroyed home and business, holding his daughter in his arms...and then he saw it._

_A fox with nine tails, towering over the destroyed buildings around him, was easily overpowering the shinobi sent to fight it. Most were on the ground, pale as death yet unmarked, and, as all the corpses Ichiraku saw before, clearly dead. Others were smears on the buildings, unlucky to be knocked aside from the fox's multiple tails. Others were just devoured by the vicious demon._

_Walking backwards slowly as if it would allay the fox's wrath, he told his daughter to not look behind her, resassuring her as much as he could. And then...the demon Kyuubi turned its gaze upon him._

_Ichiraku was brave for a civilian and had been through one of the Great Shinobi Wars, providing food and medical care for the convalescence of injured Konoha shinobis. However, when that beast turned its eyes, omniscient as they are cruel, his bravery turned to fear. He took a sharp intake of breath and was unable to exhale. Soon after, he felt a warm liquid trailing down his leg and into the dusty ground._

_He didn't even notice when a large frog came up behind the fox with a small figure standing on top of it. The only thought that trailed through his mind was..._

_He was going to die here._

_Die like the rest of the pale-faced corpses on the floor._

_His lungs started to burn, yet he could not take a breath. He was going to die...he was going to die..._

_"Shiki Fujin!" A voice rung out through the sounds of battle and a crimson light flashed. The eyes which he stared at blew away into dust. Ichiraku fell to his knees into his own pool of urine with his daughter still in his arms, hyperventilating, and hugging his daughter even tighter than before._

_Cheers rang out into the air, but Ichiraku paid no attention. He knew that he was supposed to die today. Tears left his eyes, falling into the fine brown hair of his daughter, grateful to whatever deity had chosen him and his daughter to live another day.__  
_  
-------

Later, Ichiraku found out that it was the Yondaime Hokage which saved him, his daughter, and the rest of the village. Yondaime died, giving his life in exchange to seal the demon into the child in front of him, Naruto. He had heard about the man's wish, to treat Naruto as a hero for keeping the demon contained. Being in Yondaime's debt, he had chosen to honor Yondaime's final wish. Sadly, he was one of the very few in the village...as Naruto personified the village's worst fears. And unlike invincible demons, people can be all too easily broken.

Ichiraku's reverie was broken when Naruto yelled exuberantly.

"Sooo ojii-san..can I have some ramen?" Naruto looked at Ichiraku expectantly with a smile, mustering up all the innocence he could muster.

"Sorry, Naruto-kun. Stove's not working right and it's too hot to make a fire. Ayame-chan is getting replacement parts. Maybe when the sun goes down." Ichiraku replied with an exasperated sigh. A look of thoughtfulness appeared on Ichiraku's face before he narrowed his eyes at Naruto, yelling without malice.

"And I'm still young! No need to call me that!" He huffed and puffed exaggeratingly, similar to the lost stories involving a wolf and several pigs.

Naruto, in response, stuck his tongue out with a smile and ran out of the ramen bar.

"Bye Ojii-san! I'll come back soon!" Naruto yelled as he ran out, smiling and waving through the district and making a beeline to his destination.

"Come back anytime." Ichiraku waved, returning Naruto's smile with one of his own.

The kid wasn't a demon…why couldn't everyone else see it?


	3. Kidnapped

A/N: Thank you for your reviews. They are much appreciated.

I am still looking for a beta reader for Coexistence. recieves updates before because I piece the story in my journal there.

Anyways, this chapter has been cut in half from another chapter and I'm not too fulfilled with it. It feels a bit too fast and this is a chapter that I will likely update for edits.

I would also like to thank PsycoPedestrian from GaiaOnline for her constructive criticism on my wordiness. I am currently deciding on whether to edit/update the two previous chapters or work on Chapter 4.

Chapter 2: Kidnapped

The cries of animals could be heard under a crescent moon, the navy blue sky sparkling with its little gems of light. The sounds of chatter could be heard throughout Konoha except for a small corner of the city being traveled by a blond-haired orange-clad brat.

His feet trailed slowly on a trail. The path used to be composed of large even slabs of grey rock and miscellaneous pebbles, but nature has reclaimed the structure. Bits of grass and other plants peeked through the cracks in the slate path while moss clung to the topside like a baby to a mother. However, the lack of maintenance had only bolstered the natural beauty of the area with the man-made footpath intertwining with the grass and the wildlife.

And then... there was the horrible monstrosity at the end of the trail, stuck close to the city wall.

This hideous building, unlike the rest of Konoha, was made of the same rough sandstone bricks which constituted the walls of the city. The building had several large cracks and large gaping holes placed haphazardly. Broken pieces of clear glass littered the ground around the apartment, their origins from the empty window frames with their broken panes. A large dent of splintered wood made its haven in the front door of the apartment.

As Naruto walked up to the door of his small apartment, he appeared to pay no heed to these things, though he took particular care to avoid the pieces of glass all over the place. As his hand reached for the doorknob of his door, he noticed that the front door was ajar. Reaching into his back pocket, Naruto pulled out a sleek metal kunai, holding it in his hand as he would a knife.

His free hand slowly pushed the door forward to meet darkness, the outline of chairs and other furniture barely visible in the shroud of night. Naruto quickly reached for the light switch next to the front door and a small ceiling bulb flickered for a moment before illuminating the room with its dim light.

Two oak chairs with broken legs stood in front of a small black television, its screen containing a large fracture mark from the top to the bottom. The oaken table had three good legs and one leg propped up by books. A navy blue sofa, nearly torn to the stuffing it held, lied on the other corner of the large living room with an orange pillow and blanket on top of it. Several portions of the corridors were caved in, preventing entrance to a good portion of the apartment.

A sigh of relief left the young Naruto's lips.

"Just the way I left it…" Naruto happily said to himself and the tense muscles of his legs and arms relaxed. His kunai went back to his back pocket before Naruto sat down on the broken chair in front of the TV. Reaching under the chair, he pulled out a black remote with red buttons and pressed the top right button. The TV flickered on with a black and white movie on the screen, the large crack providing distortions of color to the moving pictures.

That's when things started turning wrong.

An unfamiliar feeling of weightlessness had emerged in Naruto before it turned into a feeling of being overstuffed.

_"Huh...I didn't eat lunch tod..."_

That was when the grueling pain hit him. Horrific intense pain.

Falling off the broken chair with a loud thud, Naruto soon started to hug his knees as he lied on his side. His entire body, tense with pain, was thrashing about on the floor. Tears, moving in streams, came out of his azure eyes.

His head felt like it was going to split. His stomach felt like he drank acid. He felt as if he had been immersed in fire, pulled apart, choked…all at once. Pain coursed through every part of his veins, making it nearly impossible for him to breathe. He violently tossed and turned before realizing that someone was screaming. It didn't take him long to realize that the person screaming was him.

It was then pity from the gods which allowed him to fall unconscious, his body moving no more.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A lurching feeling slightly above his navel caused the blonde child to stir, eyelids opening very slowly. Narrow pupils dilated to compensate for the pale illumination, but, for now, Naruto couldn't even see a foot in front of him.

He felt wet, very wet. And cold. His clothes were soaked as he continued to lie on the floor, eyes still staring up at the ceiling. Hands then entered into the cold chilling water in order to lift the body it was connected to. Soon, his feet and ankles were the only things left in the water. As Naruto's eyes grew more and more accustomed to the light, he found a bumpy yet smooth wall to lean on.

Keeping his eyes closed to alleviate the feeling of dizziness he had, Naruto inhaled the dank stagnant air. He tentatively removed his weight from the wall. Opening his eyes, an expression of surprise and awe lit his face.

It was a large tunnel, a very large tunnel. Made out of the pipes that looked like those in his apartment, except these pipes didn't have gaping holes and dents.

With the dim light, Naruto couldn't see the ends of the tunnel, but they seemed to go on forever. Further examining his new surroundings, his hands traced the dark coal bricks and the large metal pipes, feeling the odd contrast of warm and cold at the same time. At that moment, Naruto had made a conclusion. He was not in Konoha anymore.

-----------------------------------------------------------------  
_  
__A small lecture hall was filled with plenty of children, some who had paper and pencil on hand while others had an expression of boredom. A young teacher with light gray hair, wearing a headband of the leaf and a large flak vest, stood on the bottom of the lecture hall, carrying a small brown history book. The teacher's brown eyes were focused on a desk at the end of the hall, occupied by one blond-haired child. A hand went over the teacher's face as he shook his head in disdain._

_"Naruto. Pay attention." _

_The child in question rose his head sleepily before burying back into his arms._

_"Naruto!" The teacher was next to him, glaring at him._

_"Eh? Mizuki-sensei. But learning makes me sleepy." Naruto rose an eyelid before taking his arms away, leaving his chin to stand on the desk. Naruto scratched his cheek before looking up at the teacher in front of him. _

_Looking exasperated, Mizuki had simply ignored Naruto's comment before returning to the front of the class and speaking._

_"Okay. Some of you are going to encounter these places during your missions. You have to assume everything in this place is dangerous. Some people have never come back upon entering a fallen city. These cities were large and used to be filled with hundreds of thousands of people," Mizuki noticed a pink-haired girl with green eyes raising her hand._

_"Yes, Sakura?"_

_"Umm...how...all the ninja and civilian villages total only amount to several million people...", Sakura timidly said. She paused as she shook her hair which covered her forehead, "How could a place fit that many people..."_

_"Good question, Sakura," Mizuki praised before going on, "These cities were believed to be extremely advanced in terms of technology and architecture before a catastrophic event rendered them into the dust. We, today, suspect that the tailed demons, bijuu, had destroyed the cities like the Kyuubi almost did to our village."_

_A tense pause thickened the air before Mizuki continued._

_"Anyways, these cities had enormous undeeerrrgrooou…nn….eellemenn…"_

_Everything went hazy.__  
_  
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Naruto blinked. Maybe he should pay a bit more attention in class next time.

Anyways the basic Shinobi Rules of Strategy said to always have water and food when in an unknown place. Well, this place was unknown, he had no food, and the water really does not look drinkable. He was also in a fallen city. He was probably in trouble. His attention still shifted to another issue.

_"How...did I get here anyways?"_

Naruto then winced as he remembered the events prior to finding himself here. The intense pain to be more specific. He shuddered and hugged his body never wanting to feel that again. As he spent several minutes to figure out how the pain and he appearing in this tunnel were connected, Naruto almost slammed his head into the wall because the answer was obvious.

Those chunnins from today! They probably did that to him and abandoned him here!

"Get me out of here!", Naruto yelled.

Silence.

After tossing several insults and barbs at his kidnappers and their parentage without a response, Naruto decided to stop wasting time.

"Fine! I'll find my own way out, bastards!" he defiantly yelled. As expected, no answer. It still didn't make him feel any less annoyed though. An irritated growl later, Naruto ran off towards one end of the tunnel, screaming and cursing...

---------------------------------------------------------------

Minutes started turning to hours. Hours started turning to days.

Naruto sluggishly wandered this tunnel, his enthusiasm long ago dampened. His throat was raw and sore from the constant threats he made to those who had left him here and the pleads for help directed to those who may be outside. His eyes darted from side to side as he nervously took another look at his surroundings.

_"Wasn't the corridor larger a second ago...and the water was never this high..."_

As he continued running through the ankle-deep water, the lights flickered above him and appeared to be dimmer than before.

With a look of panic, Naruto ran through the tunnel even faster before tripping over a floating piece of wood. The water felt like a concrete wall as he crashed facefirst. Cold and tired, Naruto hugged his legs with his arms, blue eyes dimming from a feeling which was the bane of human existence.

Despair.

"Can you get me out now? I learned my lesson," Naruto pleaded weakly, eyes turning side to side, staring at the tunnel's walls. The space between them was smaller than it was a second ago. He was sure of it. His breathing became faster and faster until he felt as though he was going to pass out. Fear became entrenched into his heart, the fear that he had conviniently ignored with every bit of his will.

He might not be able to get out of here. Might never see ojji-san or the Hokage or Ayame-chan again. Will never achieve his dream.

Something strange bubbled up inside his chest, something intangible yet powerful enough to cause Naruto to raise his head at the ceiling with a defiant stare.

_"No! I will get back, I will see them again and I will become Hokage!"_

Suddenly standing up with renewed vigor, Naruto struck the wall closest to him with the knuckles of his fists.

"Let me..." A small whisper had left Naruto's lips.

Thud.

"out.." The whisper became louder...to a tense heartfelt murmur.

Thud.

"OR YOU'LL BE..." The murmur into a yell.

Thud.

"SORRY!" Naruto roared with all of the strength he could muster.

Boom.

Everything shattered. The walls and ceiling of his prison turned into pieces of black glass. The sharp thin shards furiously rained down on Naruto who rose his arms above his head, closed his eyes, and dropped down. All that could be heard was the sound of glass impacting water.


	4. An Unplanned Meeting

A/N: Sorry for the long long delay in getting this out. I'm currently working on another piece for Persona 3. Anyways...thank you for people that reviewed...

Puregarnet: I'm trying to improve the length of my chapters...but it's rather hard for me to do so. I simply think and write in small chunks. However, thank you for your reviews. . I'll try who you recommend as a beta-reader for the next chpter. .

Zyu: Thank you. Again, I will try to work on length. ..

Doxkid & foreverdoomed: Thanks. :D

Thank you for the others who reviewed.

--

The glass rain continued to rain onto the ground until there was silence.

Several seconds passed. Then several minutes. Still silence.

Naruto slowly opened his eyes, staring at his reflection in the dark stagnant water. As he moved his hands away from his head and stood up, Naruto stared at his arms and legs. Nothing. No injuries. There was no sign of the glass that rained down onto his body or in this room.

_'WAIT, what happened to the pipes!'_

Naruto's eyes widened, taking in the new room he was in. It was nothing like the dark corridors he was in earlier except for the pipes in the walls. It was a large spacious square room which appeared to have no exit. The room was lit somehow despite not having an actual source of light. However, the thing that really caught his attention was the humongous gate with a piece of paper between the two doors. After several attempts at jumping for the damn thing, Naruto knew his attempts would yield no fruit.

Failing that, Naruto tried reading the slip of paper only to find that he was unfamiliar with that specific kanji. However, the gate seemed to be the only way out of this large room and the bars of the gate were spaced enough that he could fit through easily.

Something, though, was making him feel uneasy about approaching the gate. Even just being near the thing gave him shivers and goosebumps. He bravely took a step inside… and found himself moments later on the opposite side of the wall with no recollection on how he got there. On top of that, he felt tired, cold, and simply wanted to curl up and hide.

His unconscious mind knew that no matter what he did, he would not be able to get out through that way, immediately discarding the gate as an option. Fear tended to do that to people. However, fear was quickly replaced by curiosity when he heard the sound of coughing in the corner of the room.

A man with dirty blonde hair was holding the temple of his head, his eyes closed in what it appeared to be pain. The most striking thing about him was the color of his eyes, deep violet, which matched the color of his kimono. His left hand was in the folds of his kimono while the arm it was attached to had a Konoha headband tied to it. Several pieces of paper, similar to the unreadable one on the door, were attached to the man's waist.

Strangely enough, several had the word kunai on them while the other had odd things such as yo-yo and fire.

Naruto stared at the new addition to the room with a strange look on his face before it turned into one of anger.

"Oi, teme! I suggest you get me out of here or else the Hokage will be looking for me," threatened Naruto, a finger pointing at the strange man.

The man stared at Naruto with a raised eyebrow before staring at the room he was in with shock and fear. Ignoring Naruto, he simply walked past him to the large foreboding gate in front of him. Eyes stared into the deep darkness, apparently unaware of the child running at him with a fist outstretched in both desperation and anger.

Thud.

_"Wait...what just happened..."_, thought Naruto.

Naruto found himself lying supine on the ground, the water soaking his backside. More importantly, the man in front of him was over him, pointing a kunai at his neck. The man was almost casual about it, still looking at the gate with a strange combination of awe, fear, and confusion and paying no heed to Naruto. Naruto just stared at the man from the water, feeling a fear, a lesser one, that was similar to going past the gate. Of course, Naruto couldn't appreciate this fact since he was more preoccupied with the man that could kill him at any moment.

The kunai though moved off his throat, causing Naruto to release the breath that his lungs begged to release. The man slowly went back to the corner and failing miserably to look as though he was part of the room with his rather gaudy purple clothing.

"How old are you?" the man asked as though he never pointed a kunai at his throat.

Naruto blinked and then blinked again before yelling, "You kidnap me and then ask me how old I am!? Who the hell are you?!" He quickly went to his feet and assumed the academy fighting stance.

_That man was not going to get him again._

Thud.

Again, Naruto found himself on the ground with the man standing over him, an expression of confusion still marring his face. He again stared at the large ominous gate in front of him before turning his back to Naruto.

"Put more weight on your back leg.", murmured the man before he returned to looking around. He stared at Naruto again with his violet eyes, making Naruto uncomfortable under the scrutiny.

"I did not kidnap you. I'm as surprised as you are...to see you here," the man rasped. An appearance of worry appeared on his face as he stared at the gate before asking, "Tell me. How old are you?"

"I'm ten. And why are you asking me this? Don't you already know who I a...", Naruto replied as he averted his eyes from the strange man.

"You're Uzumaki Naruto and...", the man coughed, "you aspire to be Hokage. You like ramen." The man paused before continuing, "Because everyone overprices everything else and Ichiraku holds the only restaurant that will actually serve you... The four people you care deeply about are Ayame-chan, Iruka-san, Ichiraku-san, and Hokage-sama." He tapped his foot in the water, waiting for the look of shock to dissipate from Naruto's face.

Naruto pointed frantically, "Are you..like..spying on me?" He took several steps back before realizing something that the man was wrong about. "Wait, who's Iruka?" His eyes glared at the man again, trying to see if the man wanted to actually cause him harm.

The man rose an eyebrow before adding, "Umino Iruka. Your academy instructor?" He closed his eyes before saying, "No...your current homeroom teacher is Mizuki-san. Am I correct?"

Naruto nervously moved back as he looked over the man, "Yeah...", he hesitantly replied before he added more enthusiastically, "He's going to kick your ass when he finds you, but he might be nice to you if you let me go now." Naruto stood more defiantly at his captor. "NOW, WHO ARE YOU?!"

The man simply replied with a "Hnn", reminding Naruto of a certain raven-haired jerk, before he moved towards the gate again, trying to see through the dark depths. As he moved a hand towards a bar, he said, "I am..." He was unable to finish as the glowing piece of paper suddenly shined with an intense yellow light.

The last thing Naruto saw before he closed his eyes to ward off the brightness was the man being wrapped around by bright yellow light with some sort of oozing red light peeking through the yellow.

Naruto's eyes winced as a bright light shined deep into them and he was aware of something rodlike poking into his back. He turned over away from the offending object to only feel his nose collide into something hard.

"Ow! What the?"

His hands covered his bruised nose, rubbing the top of it in a poor attempt to allay the pain. He fumbled left and right angrily on the cool hard floor, bumping into various other things including the one that caused this incident in the first place.

His eyes attempted to get acclimated to his new surroundings...to only find himself back in familiarity. The large sofa in the back of the room, the white noise that all TVs make when not tuned in, the leg of an upturned chair which dug into his back, and the table smashing his nose inwards.

_Was it all just a dream? Everything?_

He tentatively lifted himself off from the hardwood floor, still holding his nose with his left hand. His right hand moved to his backside and his legs.

_Well...my back and feet aren't wet..._

Tick...tock...tick...tock...

Ears finally picked up on the typical noises of a clock, causing Naruto to stare at the small watch under the table. After holding his head with his hands, Naruto said in a bare whisper.

"Only three hours?"

His legs took him to the broken window and he stared into the view. The moon and the stars were still plastered on the navy blue sky with no sign that the sun will ever come. The sounds of the forest and the village were non-existant, man and beast asleep at this hour. The only sign of human existence is the lit fire which Naruto can barely see at the upper corner of his window.

He moved to the sofa, his heart pumping adrenaline throughout his body. That couldn't possibly be a dream. It was so vivid. He could feel the water down his back and ankles. The strain of his eyes as it tried to see in darkness. The cool metallic touch of the pipes on his hands. The feeling of an immovable object colliding in his ankle and the subsequent fall. Getting slammed into the water...twice.

That wasn't real?

Naruto reached for the remote which had made its way to the sofa after he woke up. The TV's screen flickered before turning back into a foggy distorted mirror. He then placed the remote down on the floor before sitting cross-legged with a look of concentration distorting the features of his young face.

He had been in pain before everything happened. Though he couldn't remember the pain exactly, he remembered that it was the most pain he had ever felt and that included the lady who beat him upon the head yelling "Demon" on his birthday. That was real. He could even feel his body shudder at the memory of it.

However, was the time in the sewers real?

His clock had said that three hours had passed. When he was in there, it felt like days where he was trapped in

that small confining shrinking darkening strangling crushing...

Naruto took a deep breath and held it as he tried to stop his rapid breathing. He relaxed his fists whose knuckles had turned into a ghostly white. He willed himself to relax his arms, his legs, and all the other muscles which had turned tense.

He blinked several times as he stared at the wall.

'_Did that wall just move a little bit closer?'_

"I think…I'm sleeping outside," Naruto nervously told himself before quickly making a break for the door. He didn't feel comfortable in this place anymore.


	5. Unexpected Consequences

A/N: Thank you to my beta-reader xXAsuka-chanXx. ^_^

---

'This was not supposed to happen.'

The man continued to lie down unmoving in the waters of the cage.

'Where did I go wrong?'

Lifting himself back to his feet, he attempted to take a few steps out before he felt a tug on his back.

There was a blood red beam of light chaining him to the center of the paper on the gate above him.

The Yondaime Hokage was certainly good at creating seals, perhaps too good. It recognized him for what he was and restrained him because of it. That seal would also explain why the true demon behind the gates had never shapeshifted and walked out. He should've seen this snag coming.

Hiraishin was a jutsu that summoned one to a specially designed seal after all; it never explored the possibilities that the seal it was locking on to was a prison.

The man sighed.

It was supposed to be so simple too. All he had to do was to come back, occupy his own body, and simply off the Uchiha. He could've done it stealthily, but he would've settled with a stab to face in the middle of Konoha's market district. The latter would've meant life in prison or an outright execution, but he didn't care.

It was for his precious people…even if they didn't know it yet.

A sigh escaped his lips.

No more moping around.

He needed to figure out how to salvage this mess. The world went black as he shut his eyes.

---

Contrary to popular belief, there were people on Naruto's side in the counsel. They didn't advertise it since that was the equivalent to political suicide (unless you were the Hokage or some other prominent figure), but their existence helped.

Koharu Utatane, one of the Sandaime Hokage's teammates, was one of these people and the second most important to Naruto's continued survival. She, similar to her other teammate Homura, was ambivalent to Naruto's existence; she faintly liked him as grandparents would like all children but didn't like the paperwork that came with him, paperwork which came in the form in 'Hi, let's try to make Naruto's life worse'.

The Hokage tried to protect Naruto's life from the council; Kotaru, on the other hand, protected Naruto's life from the civilians. It was her rumors through the civilian populace that killing Naruto would release the demon fox. As she stared at Naruto's sleeping form on the bench, she would have to say it was probably one of the best lies she ever made.

People believed that Naruto was the living reincarnation of the Kyuubi, so they originally held the mindset of 'kill the child, kill the demon.' It was true, but it was also detrimental to Naruto's continued survival since many people would gladly 'risk' their lives to end the Kyuubi threat. Her rumors stopped that, though it didn't stop the abuse that both civilians and ninja heaped upon him.

It would be a mistake to say that Koharu liked Naruto for who he was though, even if she believed that children should live good childhoods.

Instead, she saw Naruto as a potential tool for Konoha, a tool that might bite back its master for past grievances. If the child showed hints of betraying the village, she would be the first to vote for investigation and, if needed, execution. However, the boy, despite his pranks to those who wronged him, still tried to win the hearts of the villagers who spat on him, and it was his strength of character that made Koharu believe in him.

Stepping outside of her home, she felt the warm night air rippling through her aged bones. Eyes watched as the small boy's chest rose and fell with every breath he took. Slowly placing a couple bills of ryo into his pockets, she turned around to start walking back towards her home with a smile.

She might've made it there too until the child suddenly screamed in agony.

---

_Everything was blurry as though Naruto was watching from within the rain. _

_Dark blurs which looked like people stood on top of a giant waterfall, two stone men doomed to glare each other down for all of eternity. Both boys…Naruto believed…were facing each other in a similar fashion. _

_Naruto blinked once and suddenly he was in the body of the guy with blurry yellow hair, facing a black-haired boy with weird spinning eyes. Naruto felt his own mouth move, but he couldn't hear a thing. The water fell but made no sound. Mouths moved but no voice came out. The world was silent. _

'_Why is he doing this?' That voice in his head sounded like him…but older. He almost felt like crying for some odd reason because of the pain in that voice. _

_He closed his eyes and opened them again and..._

_He felt his trachea suddenly close against his will. Fingers were wrapped around his neck and lifted him high above the…water? He choked, coughed, and felt himself struggle within the other male's grasp; the loud chirping of many birds filled his ears, and he witnessed lightning surrounding the other male's hand like a hellish aura. The hairs on his body stood on end. The other male's mouth moved again, but no sound came out. However, the voice inside his head did._

'_Best friend? I don't understand…'_

'_He's going to kill me…'_

'_I'm going to die…_

_But…I promised…Sakura…'_

'_My ninja way…'_

_His body suddenly felt light, and the pressure in his throat was no more. Something seemed to come up from within his belly, fueling him, enraging him. Everything seemed sharper, and he suddenly could pick out the dark markings on the other kid's face and its grin of malice._

"_It's too late now, Naruto!" The other male laughed and suddenly the blade of lightning plunged forward._

_---_

The 8-year old Naruto suddenly screamed and gripped the right side of his chest. It was as though he heated up a pointy piece of metal and shoved it through his chest…except this was so much worse. He felt like he was cooking from the inside-out.

He could smell his skin and other gooey things from his body getting cooked. Eyes suddenly caught the image of a worried old lady before rolling up into his head.

---

Koharu immediately carried the unconscious child towards the Hokage Tower, running through the roof and making sure not to drop her precious cargo.

What just happened? The child was sleeping and suddenly screamed as though someone was kicking the shit of him.

In an effort to get some answers, she slowly brought her hand to the child's forehead, her palm glowing green with the light of a diagnostic jutsu. She was trained mainly as a medic-nin. However, the only thing anomalous about the boy's physical condition was that he was suffering from malnutrition, and he pretty much had suffered from that for all of his lifetime with no sudden effects like this.

Watching another wince of pain run on the child's face, she instantly suspected genjutsu and brought her hand to the appropriate symbol, mumbling the word "kai." Naruto's face didn't change despite all of her efforts. She became worried. The enemy that you do not know is far more dangerous than the enemy that you do know, after all.

In her peripheral vision, she saw the light at the very top of the Hokage Tower, meaning the Hokage was still working his late hours for the sake of the village. She couldn't go through the bottom floor upwards. People, civilians in particular, would see her with the 'demon child,' and it would ruin what steps she took to keep the child safe. The rumors about her would circulate which may undo the rumors she herself had created, and that would mean Naruto would need a full ANBU escort once again.

The side door would probably be the safest bet, accessible only to those who knew the ninja arts. Though it didn't get her directly in the Hokage's Office, it still placed her in the same floor as said office, and most of the ninja present as the Hokage's guards generally shared the same views of the Naruto as he did. She did sourly note that one Umino Iruka didn't, but he was probably sleeping at this time instead of helping the Hokage with the mission reports.

Opening up the side panel on the tower, she walked inside and took great care to slowly approach out of the other end. Almost immediately, two jounin had stopped her right after she stepped into the hallway.

"Is that..?" one of the jounin said.

"Yes. And I'll have your head if this gets out," replied Koharu. The jounin took a step backwards at her icy glare.

"You have our silence, Koharu-sama," said the other while the first one only nodded dumbly. She merely walked by the two and towards the door which marked the Hokage's office. Koharu merely caught a glimpse of the secretary widening her eyes before she went through the door and locked it behind her.

The Hokage's Office was a simple place really, a single desk with piles of paper in the middle of the room while the Hokage sits behind the desk. Right now, the Sandaime Hokage was actually not reading pieces of paperwork but a suspicious orange book with a 'Do not' symbol on the back of its cover.

Without looking up, the Sandaime Hokage simply said with a slightly perverted laugh, "Ahh…Kakashi. You're back already? I hope you don't mind if I could borrow this a little longer."

Koharu, forgetting about the boy draped over her shoulder, said sarcastically, "Sarutobi, you're a bit too old to be reading porn. You might kill yourself, and Danzo will end up being the Godaime."

"Errk." The Sandaime choked, and the book flew above his head. He finally caught the damning object before staring at Koharu and the child over her shoulder.

The Hokage instantly sobered upon realizing on who that person was. The book was laid forgotten in the middle of his papers.

"Koharu, report." The man named 'The Professor,' known for his mastery of jutsu theory and creation, came back to the surface, Sandaime Hokage at his most dangerous.

Koharu immediately lowered the boy to a chair and suddenly moved to attention. She may be a member of the council, but she was still a ninja foremost.

"Hokage-sama, Naruto was sleeping on a bench near my residence before he started screaming in what it appears to be pain." She looked over at Naruto who continued to grimace before adding, "I attempted to discern the reason with a diagnostic jutsu, but, other than some malnutrition, there was nothing wrong with him. I immediately suspected genjutsu afterwards, but my attempts to dispel did not change his condition."

The Sandaime simply moved his pipe of tobacco into his mouth before frowning.

"What was Naruto doing so close to your place of residence anyways?" the Sandaime asked.

"I could not discern the reason. I saw the child sleeping peacefully before he started screaming however," she stared levelly at Sandaime. She knew it sounded suspicious, but her teammate knew that she did try to prevent such things from happening.

The Sandaime stared at Koharu before saying, "That is worrisome. I'll arrange an escort to bring Naruto to the hospital for further testing." He stared at the boy, and his gaze softened. "If his condition does not improve, I will have to recall Jiraiya."

Koharu's eyes widened before looking over to Naruto. She whispered, "Wait, you don't suspect th-"

The Sandaime shook his head and looked at the still-unconscious Naruto, "I doubt…it…is trying to taking over his mind, but you are aware of the intel reports of the Sand's jinchuuriki suffering from severe insomnia due to what he contains. It's possible that…it…may possibly be causing these effects inadvertently."

The elderly woman sighed, "Do you think Jiraiya would be able to do anything if the seal needed improvement?"

"I hope so."

"Your answer isn't very encouraging."

"I know, but I feel that Naruto will still be able to get through this trial."

"Speaking of trials…wouldn't Naruto be better of-"

The Sandaime turned stern as he looked at Koharu, "No. You've asked me this many times, but the answer will always be no."

Koharu opened her mouth to protest, but the Sandaime held up his hand.

"Look. There are several reasons why Naruto cannot leave the village, some of which I cannot tell you. However, though Naruto's identity as a jinchuuriki is not completely out in the open like Suna's, many would simply use the boy as a weapon, a weapon which may be pointed at Konoha."

Koharu sighed, "But personally?"

The Sandaime said, "Minato wanted the village to view this child as a hero…but…I have failed to let them see him in that way. I…try to be there for him whenever I can…" He brought both his hands to his face and slid them down, a sigh escaping through his lips. "But I know it's not enough. However, I will still abide by Minato's last wishes that, even if the village ridiculed the child, I not move him away from Konoha."

"What?! What kind of father would do that to their own son?" The resulting yell might've been heard by those outside if it weren't for the silencing seals muting the sounds coming out of the room.

"Minato believed in the philosophy that Konoha did not belong to him even when he reigned as Yondaime Hokage. Instead, he believed that he belonged to Konoha, and he believed this to be true of his son as well."

"I didn't think Minato thought his son would be abused and needing ANBU to fend off those who wanted to kill him," she replied scathingly.

"…Not to this extent, no, " the Sandaime replied.

"What does that mean?"

"…I once asked Minato about how he would raise his child." The Hokage's eyes glazed as he recalled a long-past memory while Koharu simply leaned in more curiously.

"He told me in a no-nonsense way…that he would love him…but he would raise him to appreciate everything even if the child ended up hating him for it," the Hokage said.

"Why?"

"Our ninjas almost entirely come from clans dedicated to the ninja arts, children who suffered a psychological problem that prevented them from doing civilian work, or orphans. Minato was a combination of the last two…"

Koharu's eyes widened. The Yondaime, the mightiest and the most famous of Konoha's ninjas, had a psychological problem? The gossip in her drooled at the news before it was painfully smothered by the knowledge that the Sandaime was telling her this in confidence.

"Minato had obsessive-compulsive personality disorder. It was minor, but he felt that every bit of work he did had to be perfect. The problem was that, in the civilian jobs, this minor thing ended up becoming rather huge." A nostalgic smile lit his face.

"I remember when Minato was injured during a mission and needed to make money for his apartment rent. He ended up in the Yamanaka's flower shop." The Hokage smiled before adding, "…and got fired on the first day. He kept trying to cut the flower stems so that they were even by **his** standards and ended up going through a month's supply of roses."

He looked over at the unconscious Naruto again, adding with a smile, "After his coronation as Yondaime, the first thing he had to deal with was a bill from Yamanaka's Florists."

Koharu chuckled before asking, "Wait, but why wouldn't his condition impede him from being a ninja?"

"To Minato, if his teammates and himself survived and finished the mission, the mission was perfect." The Hokage let a puff of smoke escape his lips, "Though…when one of his genin ended up getting killed… he ended up hospitalizing himself due to too much training, but…once he recovered, he was the one who requested the mission to destroy the hearts and minds of the Iwa ninja."

"Wait, he requested…that mission? That was a suicide mission, and he still…" Koharu's face revealed awe and a bit of shock at the news. The Yondaime's decimation of nearly one-half of the ninjas in Iwa's home turf was still legendary today.

He blew another smoke ring and added, "Anyways...I was getting off-topic. Minato was born an orphan before we had the "orphan's allowance" plan for aspiring ninja. He worked hard to have food in his stomach and earn the tuition for the ninja academy. When he graduated and introduced himself as part of the teamwork exercise for genin teams, Minato answered… 'My dream is to protect Konoha, and I'll become a god among men if need be to achieve that.' And I think he achieved that, carrying both the titles of Hokage and the Yellow Flash…"

"He was probably the hardest worker I have ever seen…short of Maito Gai," the Hokage gratuitously added.

Both shivered as the image of a green-spandex toting Yondaime appeared in their heads.

"Anyways…sorry for the image… By working hard for everything, he learned not to take anything for granted." He turned to look at the Hokage monument with a small amount of pride, staring at the Yondaime's face.

"Minato suffered through a lot as an orphan. Certainly not as much as Naruto, but it was still suffering. Minato told me that he became stronger and wiser because of it, and he wants Naruto to know those lessons and have that strength. That is why I honor his last wish, though I do try to spend time with the boy just as Minato would've done despite his 'teachings.'"

Knocking on the door interrupted the Sandaime's history lesson, and Koharu, disappointed, unlocked the door, allowing the two medic-nin, both dressed in sterile white, to stand at attention.

The Sandaime started dispensing his orders to the two ninja along with veiled threats if something untoward happened to be the boy.

---

Unknown to Koharu and Sarutobi, there was an eavesdropper in the room. It wasn't Naruto but the man who dwelled inside the confines of the Kyuubi seal. He could still hear them despite Naruto's unconsciousness because Naruto's mind was still processing the information…in an 'in one ear and out the other' sort of way.

Exhaling and opening his eyes, the man started crying. Even after several years upon discovering his father's identity, he cried. He wasn't sure why he was crying either. It might've been happiness from finally discovering about his father outside of 'He uses Rasengan,' 'He sealed a giant fox into your belly,' and 'He killed lots of people.' It might've been sadness from finding out that his father might not treat him any different from the villagers. It might've been anger that his father wanted him to stay even when the village went hostile on him.

The ninja part of the man though agreed with his father's assessment. As a result from living his childhood in such a manner, his mental strength was inhumane…or he was already broken and too dumb to realize it.

The man, tears in his eyes, chuckled at the thought and felt the chain of the seal loosening up on his body. He…hadn't cried in a long time. Hadn't cried since everyone 'died' and when he became truly alone. Even Orochimaru would have been a decent companion to the loneliness he ended up feeling for the remaining years of his past life…that and he always wanted to call him Pedo-maru to his face.

A smile lit his face. He might still have a chance at doing that actually.

He…was happier now. Old faces that he barely remembered reappeared …ironically including his own. Voices that he thought were forever silenced were heard once more. However, he wasn't satisfied from just watching though. He had too much to do…like preventing the future from coming to pass.

Uzumaki Naruto would never let down his precious people.

And now back to trying to get out of this mousetrap and figure out why his 'vessel' was unconscious.


End file.
